At
Research In Motion (RIM), a Waterloo firm, enormous market success
has been achieved with their BlackBerryÔ
solution. The company positions themselves as “the leader in wireless
data.” Current product taglines include “BlackBerryÔ
wireless email solution” and “Wireless email that means business.”
But four years ago the product was released as a
“wireless two-way pager.” This concept has been left behind in order
to drop any associations with “pagers” as a product category. And
clearly, the new RIM strategy cultivates a strong association with
“email” – one of the most popular applications of all time, and a
strong brand in its own right.
Across the Pacific Ocean, DoCoMo has
emerged as a success in mobile data. This is an example of a well
designed “product identity”– as described by Frank Rose in a
Wired magazine article. He comments that, in the evolution of
using cell phones to access the internet, “...WAP became known as ‘WAP
is Crap,’ yet i-mode, introduced with minimal expectations in February
1999, has attracted more than 25 million subscribers – one-fifth of
Japan's population. New subscribers are still signing on at the rate
of 43,000 a day, 1.3 million a month. The Internet is never mentioned
in the ads they see; the i in i-mode stands for "information," and the
logo - a large, stylized i - plays off the i that marks the
information booths in subways and airports. Japan's infatuation with
English-language product names even extends to DoCoMo itself: Ads
proclaim it an acronym for ‘Do Communications over the Mobile
network,’ but dokomo is also a word in Japanese. It means
‘everywhere’."
Also, the product definition includes the
handheld device and the network, to ensure an easy adoption and
userfriendly buyer experience. So the DoCoMo identity created a
“Tornado-grade” brand association, or “anchor”, in the minds of
buyers. Here are the key lessons learned:
1. The “Internet” is seen as a tool for Techies – but
“information” is for
everybody.
2. The “i” logo had a pre-existing association (anchor)
with “information”.
3. The double anchor for DoCoMo, with “everywhere” as an
alternate
meaning, is an amazing piece of “identity”
success – a bit of brilliance, a
bit of luck.
4. The DoCoMo whole product strategy ensured a “no
surprises” buyer
experience, and no danger of being constrained to
a small market of
“techie” users.
Building your own Brand
– Building a strong brand can be complicated, but there are some
simple rules you can use to get started. It does not take a lot of
money. Great brands are based on simple ideas that cover three
essential concepts – these concepts are intertwined in the mind of the
prospect. I call them the “three wise men” of bootstrap branding:
•
Product category,
•
Identity, and
•
Associations.
Product Category
– Much has already been said and written about the psychology of
adoption for new ideas, so I’ll keep this short. In essence, people
have very little space for a new idea, so they place it with reference
to an existing idea, familiar to them. A “mini-van” is a good example.
It is like a sedan, but with much more space – like a van, but
smaller, so you can easily get it in your garage. So the new idea is
placed somewhere between “sedan” and “van”, with more useful capacity
than a “station wagon” – note that these are product categories, not
individual products. There are just too many car models on the road
for a buyer to relate to, so in the mind of a buyer they are grouped
into categories. A buyer’s initial interest depends on finding a
simple placement of the category in relation to their own experience.
This is true for all products in any large
market. The impact of a strong new category is dramatic. When Chrysler
conceived and launched the mini-van in the 1980s, it became a great
bandwagon for growth – one the other automakers had
to respond to, and one that changed the revenue
patterns in all adjacent categories, leading to the demise of the
station wagon.
For technology offers, you often can’t see a
physical product, making it hard for a prospect to understand what’s
new – so the category definition becomes a critical part of
positioning. The buyer’s default reaction is to assume your new offer
is in an existing category until they can “see” it or “test drive” it
– to experience what is different. So if you want to be in a new
technology category, you have to help define and name the category.
Also, initial marketing work has to be aimed primarily at explaining
the new category, and creating differentiation as compared to existing
categories.
Are their other reasons why is “category” so
important? Yes, in addition to attaching ideas to familiar concepts
there is a need to accelerate thought movement through
word of mouth,
or “viral marketing”. We all talk about viral
marketing, but what makes it work? Here are several factors – you can
evaluate your own product’s strength in each of these attributes:
•
the boldness of an idea,
•
the associations of an idea,
•
the emotional appeal,
•
the relevance of the idea to an individual,
•
the relevance of the idea to a buyer’s professional community,
•
the ease of transmitting the idea,
•
the number of people doing the transmitting,
•
the number of “connectors” helping to accelerate transmission
The “connectors” are, in any given community, that small number of
people who have a really broad contact base (e.g. over 1000 phone
numbers in their personal database). Some of them are known as
“thought leaders” because their broad connections are matched by a
driving interest in new paradigms, new technologies, & new product
categories. They can be found as industry analysts, writers, and/or
speakers at industry conferences, large and small, and they are
usually hard to reach but very interested in what you are doing.
Finding them and cultivating relationships will help you. They
understand what changes are taking place in product categories, and
when a new category is emerging, and they are usually involved in
naming categories, as well as propagating the news about new
paradigms.
In discussing category dynamics with Gord Smith at Hewson
Bridge & Smith, he commented "Industry Analysts are key to
creating a buzz...they love to coin the phrase, which in essence makes
them the "gurus" in the field; e.g. ERP II (Enterprise Resource
Planning II from the Gartner Group) versus ECM (Enterprise Commerce
Management from AMR Research)."
More about “connectors” is given in a superb book for entrepreneurs
and marketers – “The Tipping Point” by Malcolm
Gladwell.
In closing, note that “product category” may be a label set by the
marketplace; it may seem like something you are stuck with. You must
not, however, leave category naming up to others. Despite the chaotic
noise of ideas competing for attention, you are an equal player and
can influence category naming, or chose where you are placed among the
categories getting mind share in your market.
We continue Bootstrap Branding with Part II in the next issue, delving
into “Identity” and “Associations.”
